Tuesday, March 9, 2010

What Is It About Big Ben That ESPN Can't Bear To Tarnish?

Contrary to the post title, this is actually the write up for David Wright. And if you believe that, you probably believe that an athlete retreats to a VIP-section where only women are allowed in to protect his privacy and doesn't point to our acceptance of a rape culture. And if you believe that, you're an idiot. Yes that's right, it's time to take a break from previewing the Mets position-by-position to engage in a little media criticism, specifically, ESPN bashing. Oh happy day!

My own ambivalence of this notwithstanding, how can anyone look at Disney Sports' coverage of this second sexually driven clusterfuck in under a year and wonder what the hell is going on over in Bristol? For starters, after reading about Big Ben's latest trouble over at The Hater Nation, I could barely find anything on ESPN.com about it, so I had to turn to a Google News search. Now tonight when I got home from Food Jerk, there was in fact a front page story on ESPN.com about Big Ben. But it wasn't much more than a press release from his high priced attorney saying that of course Ben Roethlisberger did no wrong and the skies will rain blood before you and some whore can prove otherwise. I'm glad, by the way, that the facts already show no criminal activity took place, because that means we can avoid the bother of a trial and police work and all those things that could possibly show criminal activity maybe took place.

Doing my best not to wander into territory covered much more competently by Sports On My Mind, I have to ask: why is that the front page story? We're talking about a high-profile athlete already dealing with one sexual assault accusation in a lawsuit, and now with a second one speeding towards his kneecaps like a cranked up linebacker, we're expected to remain dumb enough to be happy with a statement from the defense and not one bit of actual, y'know, journalism. Of course, by journalism, I mean an orgy of speculation and talking head jackassery. I want Skip Balyess calling for Big Ben to be chemically castrated, then changing his mind and declaring Roethlisberger has bathed in the blood of the Lamb when Michael Wilbon suggests Big Ben needs to get his act together, and then going right back to the castration just to get some poor schmuck to spit his coffee up at ol'Skip's unpredictability.

And I certainly don't mean the WTF moment when Kelly Naqi mentions that the Georgia Bureau of Investigation wouldn't go into whether Roethlisberger's accuser was credible. Are you fucking kidding me with this credibility thing? I don't think I can name another famous human being in my lifetime who's been accused of two rapes in this short a time frame, and I sure as shit can't name one who anyone would ever think of as remotely credible. Unless of course he had a multibillion-dollar media conglomerate trying to shove his lawyer's communiques down our throats.